When modern digital media is blended with real-world experiences and combined with social media, it can change learning from a “one-to-many” experience (that is, expert instructor to learners) to a more-effective “many-to-many” experience (expert instructors and learners all helping one another learn). The cost of producing learning experiences has gone down. Blended learning experiences in which learners “make and create” (as they would do in a real task) often make the best learning experiences; with modern digital media, these experiences can be shared and discussed via social networks. Research has shown that the most effective learning experiences need to be designed to include the following:

Peer-to-peer interaction

Passion about the learning topic

Purpose (connect the learning to real-world job tasks or requirements)

In most current learning experiences, these 3 aspects do not often come together. Connie’s research retrospectively showed how people learned. She made “learning maps,” which showed how people learned; there are a lot of contexts from which people learn (formal instruction, self-paced learning, learning on the job, etc.). This is where learning badges can come in – digital learning badges are a validated indicator of accomplishment, skill, quality, or interest that can be earned in various learning environments.